Fabrication of nanostructures through molecular self-assembly of small amphiphilic glyco-dehydropeptides

Manohar Mahato, Varun Arora, Rajiv Pathak, Hemant K. Gautam, Ashwani Kumar Sharma

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

38 Scopus citations

Abstract

Self-assembled peptide-based nanostructures have been the focus of research in the past decade because of their potential applications in various biological systems. Normally, small self-assembled peptide nanostructures contain hydrophobic moieties, therefore, their solubility in aqueous systems poses the important challenge in the field of molecular self-assembly in order to make effective use of these in a wide variety of applications. To improve their aqueous solubility, the self-assembled amphiphilic α,β- dehydrophenylalanine containing small glyco-dehydropeptides, Boc-Phe-ΔPhe-εAhx-GA (I) and H-Phe-ΔPhe-εAhx-GA (II) with glucosamine (GA) attached at the C-terminal through a 6-aminocaproic acid linker, were synthesized, demonstrating the formation of nanostructures in aqueous media, which were characterized by DLS, AFM and TEM. Further, nanostructure II reduced auric chloride to gold nanoparticles and formed a peptide-gold conjugate (VII). The feasibility of using the nanostructures I and II as nanovectors for drug delivery was demonstrated by loading hydrophobic molecules, eosin and N-fluoresceinyl-2-aminoethanol (FAE) dyes. Besides, these peptides displayed antimicrobial activity against Micrococcus flavus, Bacillus subtilis and Pseudomonas aeruginosa. All these results advocate the potential of these nanostructures as efficient vectors for drug delivery applications.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)1742-1749
Number of pages8
JournalMolecular BioSystems
Volume8
Issue number6
DOIs
StatePublished - Jun 2012
Externally publishedYes

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Biotechnology
  • Molecular Biology

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